Daily Log

Got up around 10:30, again falling just short of six hours sleep. Read some, and came down around 11. I published my Music Week (6:1) last night, and did the cutoff for this week's Music Week, adding the notebook entry below, but that's as far as I got. Laura wants to watch The Comeback, so we got through the second episode last night. I watched a second season episode of Beyond Paradise after that, a series Laura gave up on. Not enough murders? (Last night's was about an arson, car tampering, and a mugging, all to steal a valuable medal.)

I have chicken to cook today. Leftover rice and bean salad should suffice. I'm tiring of the Pasquinelli book, but I'm near the end. A couple of interesting ideas in there about how machinery reifies social and economic relations, as well as thinking about thinking in a more systematic way. The sections on AI itself don't seem to go beyond what I already know. I want to look at the Omer Bartov book next. I think it's arguable that Israel's appetite for genocide flagged a bit last fall, but is back in force in Lebanon. I'll be looking into that.

Back from rebooting. Now I have to get my six workspaces set up, so I can start working again.

Email (28 messages):

• My Substack post, Music Week (6:1): shareable assets, 4 likes, 1 new subscriber.
• TomDispatch: Engelhardt, A Personal TomDispatch Farewell (of Sorts). He's retiring as editor, turning the mailing list over to his former intern Nick Turse, who will continue to write for The Intercept. He's also starting a Substack, so I'll probably subscribe to it.
• Project Syndicate: more interesting articles.
• Phil Overeem: Let's Get Physical. I couldn't read the post, which seems to require the app, or a paid subscription. I wrote to Phil and complained about this. I heard back from Phil, who tells me that his "Physical Media" posts are for his paid tier ("I have a few"), "however, free subscribers get one free peek" (which is probably what the app was offering). Also says he's "up to almost 200 total subscribers (might be over that)."

I found a "Savory Soy-Honey Marinade" recipe on Google, and mixed up a batch for the chicken thighs. I wrote up the recipe here.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, June archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 47 albums, 6 A-list

Music: Current count 46048 [46001] rated (+47), 20 [32] unrated (-12).

New records reviewed this week:

• Sheldon Agwu: Kintsugi (2025, Sanctum): [bc]: B+(*)
• Wayne Alpern: Varieties & Extravaganzas (Henri Elkan Music)
• David Ambrosio/Donny McCaslin/Ingrid Jensen/Bruce Barth/Victor Lewis: Civil Disobedience: Blue Note in the Progressive Sixties (2026, Blue Frog): [sp]: B+(**)
• Richard Baratta: Another Kind of Bird (2026, Savant): [sp]: B+(*)
• Big K.R.I.T.: Dedicated to Cadalee Biarritz Vol. 1 (2025, Multi Alumni/ONErpm): [sp]: A-
• Bomba Estéreo/Rawayana: Astropical (2025, Sony Music Latin): [sp]: B+(***)
• Sofia Borges/Rieko Okuda/Peter Van Huffel: Lagrangian Points (2024 [2026], 4DaRecord): [dl]: B+(***)
• Bobby Bradford/Mark Dresser/Hafez Modirzadeh: Sonic House Reunion (2026, NoBusiness): [cd]: B+(**)
• Anthony Caceres: Let's Take a Trip (2026, Jig in G): [cd]: B+(*)
• Daniel Carter/Steve Hirsh: Convocation (2023 [2026], Mahakala Music): [bc]: B+(***)
• Confucius MC/Bastien Keb: Songs for Lost Travellers (2025, Native Rebel): [sp]: B+(**)
• Conway the Machine: You Can't Kill God With Bullets (2025, Drumwork/Roc Nation): [sp]: B+(***)
• Charles Downs Quartet: Inner (2024 [2026], ESP-Disk'): [cd]: A-
• Feeble Little Horse: Bitknot (2026, Saddle Creek): [sp]: B+(**)
• Chad Fowler & Matt Lavelle Quartet: Whirlpool (2022 [2026], Mahakala Music): [bc]: B+(***)
• Greg Freeman: Burnover (2025, Transgressive): [sp]: B
• George: Looking for Consonance (2024 [2026], Out of Your Head): [cd]: B+(***)
• Rafael Greco: Versos Bajo Mi Sombra/Verses Under My Shadow (2025 [2026], Blue Canoe): [cd]: B+(**)
• Gyrofield: Suspension of Belief (2025, Kapsela, EP): [sp]: B+(***)
• Gyrofield: Your Fight (2026, Field Research, EP): [sp]: B+(***)
• Anna von Hausswolff: Iconoclasts (2025, Year0001): [sp]: B
• Homeboy Sandman: Turns Out I Can Sell a Few More of These (2025, Dirty Looks, EP): [sp]: B+(**)
• Larkin Poe: Bloom (2025, Tricki-Woo): [sp]: B+(*)
• Janel Leppin: Slowly Melting (2026, Cuneiform): [dl]: B+(*)
• Janel Leppin's Ensemble Volcanic Ash: Pluto in Aquarius (2026, Cuneiform): [sp]: B+(**)
• Lip Critic: Theft World (2026, Partisan): [sp]: B+(***)
• Nas & DJ Premier: Light-Years (2025, Mass Appeal): [sp]: B+(***)
• John Pachnos: John Pachnos (2026, Avgonyma Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Ivo Perelman: Trifecta (2022-24 [2026], Mahakala Music, 3CD): [bc]: A-
• Ivo Perelman/Damon Smith: Duologue: Core of Existence (2026, Squid Note): [bc]: B+(***)
• Rival Consoles: Landscape From Memory (2025, Erased Tapes): [sp]: B+(**)
• Yvonne Rogers: The Button Jar (2025 [2026], Pyroclastic): [cd]: B+(**)
• Thom Rotella: Right Time Left (2025, HighNote): [sp]: B+(*)
• Scott Sadlon: Songs From Thin Air (2022 [2026], Buddha Boy): [sp]: B+(***)
• Salin: Rammana (2025, Salin): [sp]: B+(*)
• Schapiro 17: Best Laid Plans (2025 [2026], Summit): [cd]: B+(*)
• KP Skywalka: I Tried to Tell You (2025, Beat the Odds): [sp]: B+(*)
• Watchhouse: Rituals (2025, Tiptoe Tiger Music): [sp]: B
• Weakened Friends: Feels Like Hell (2025, Don Giovanni): [sp]: B+(***)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Kenny Barron/Ray Drummond/Ben Riley: So Many Lovely Things: Live in Brecon (1995 [2026], Elemental Music, 2CD): [cd]: A- [06-12]
• Marion Brown: Live in Europe 1968 & 1972 (1968-72 [2026], NoBusiness): [cd]: B+(**)
• Daniel Carter/Sabir Mateen/William Parker/Lou Grassi: Keeping It in Context (1996 [2026], NoBusiness): [cd]: A-
• Sunny Murray/Sabu Toyozumi: Sun's Blessings (1999 [2026], NoBusiness): [cd]: A-
• Toshiyuki Sekine Trio: Strode Road (1978 [2025], Craftman): [yt]: B+(***)

Old music:

• George: Shorts (2022 [2023], Out of Your Head): [bc]: B+(*)
• Lip Critic: Hex Dealer (2024, Partisan): [sp]: B+(**)
• Yvonne Rogers: Seeds (2022 [2023], Relative Pitch): [bc]: B+(**)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• New England Jazz Collaborative: Tributaries (ACP) [07-16]
• The Phoenix Trio: Tomorrow Is Today (Giant Step Arts) [06-19]

Daily Log

Came down around 10:30, having slept slightly less than six hours. Last night I decided that instead of posting what I had for Music Week, I'd send an excerpt out to Substack first. I started working on that, but Laura wanted to shift TV time earlier, and afterwards I just worked on the puzzle. Then I realized I still had laundry washed but not dried, so stayed up later than I wanted to get that done. I'll work on that today. I did get Xgau Sez posted yesterday.

We went to Trader Joe's and Dillons yesterday. I bought some chicken, and will try making the arroz con pollo from the Puerto Rican cookbook I checked out. Only package of thighs with skin I could find was huge, so I have to decide whether to make it all, or split it for another recipe (either freeze it, or turn it into something a bit more durable). The cookbook was a library checkout, and I didn't find much else I wanted to try in it. The recipe calls for separating the skin, roasting it separately, then using it as a garnish for the rice and meat.

When we got into the car after Dillons, the bluetooth connection between the car and the phone didn't work, so we had no music for the return trip. Laura tried various things to fix it, to no avail. That remains as a project. I find the lack of any diagnostics very frustrating, and info on the internet isn't very helpful. Lack of a CD player is my main complaint about the car, but it is getting to be a major one. I'll try to figure this out, but Laura allowed as I should get a new phone, and possibly we should start shopping for a new car. We can, after all, afford something much nicer, and we don't have a lot of time left to treat ourselves.

Email (27 messages):

• RiotRiot: An interview with the Mekons. Actually, Jon Langford.
• Substack May 2026 stats in review: 106 subscribers (+7), 364 post reads (+117). The new subscriber breakdown shows 43% coming from tomhull.com. I think that means 3.
• Substack: Introducing Reply Rules: "Creators can now set the rules for their own community, in their own words."
• Clean Feed: After 25 years, they're giving up on new releases, with one last one from the late Sei Miguel (trumpet).
• Delivered: Omer Bartov: Israel: What Went Wrong?

I checked out a Puerto Rican cookbook from the library, by Mia Castro: Cocina Puerto Rico: Recipes From My Abuela's Kitchen to Yours. I thought I might construct an interesting dinner from it, like I did with Pyet DeSpain's Rooted in Fire. But when I thumbed through it, I didn't find much that interested me. Still, I thought I might try her arroz con pollo. It's a dish Laura likes, and is pretty sufficient for a single-dish dinner. I bought some chicken thighs yesterday to try it, but I didn't write up a proper shopping list, so I wound up finding myself with no cilantro, let alone culantro. Still, I pushed ahead today. While the recipe seems simple enough, it is actually based on three other recipes: adobo, sofrito, and saizo. Those, along with a few more prep mixes, are used throughout the cookbook, and the recipes are designed for 4-8 times as much as you're likely to need for any given recipe. So first thing I had to do was to scale those recipes down, roughly to one-quarter. I wound up buying 5 lbs of chicken thighs, but only needed 1.5 lbs. I used four, which started at 2 lbs but came to barely over 1.1 lbs boned and skinned. I roasted the skin and bones, and rubbed the meat with adobo, then browned it. I then fried the sofrito and olives, added the rice, and the stock. The recipe called for 2 cups of rice (I used arborio) but only 2.5 cups of stock. That turned out to be not enough, so the rice came out undercooked, and I wound up spending a lot of time trying to correct for that. It also came out way too salty, which was mostly the fault of the adobo and saizo being largely made up of salt. The smarter thing would have been to keep the salt separate from the other spices. Since I had made so much, I figured it would do little harm to over-spice, but I got over-salt instead. I've since tried to de-salt and soften up the rice. Now it errs on the side of bland mush.

For a side, I thought I'd make a salad with black beans. I looked for a recipe, found something with tomatoes and feta, and jotted down the dressing. I then ad-libbed the contents, using a cucumber, red onion, red bell pepper, black olives, capers, parsley (I didn't have basil, or cilantro), and cotijo cheese (I had feta, but with a chunk left over I thought I'd substitute something more Latin American). Dressing recipe called for 1T olive oil, 2T white balsamic vinegar, and 1T lemon juice. I used more olive oil and less vinegar, then added more olive oil. It came out OK. I took a couple of plate pics, but nothing here to brag about. I now have six more chicken thighs in the refrigerator. I think what I'll do tomorrow is marinate them in something, then roast them in a hot oven. My first thought was an Ottolengthi dish, but I don't have the ingredients for it. So I looked on the internet. First recipe I found called for low-sodium soy sauce and sugarless maple syrup. That's not happening. But I'll probably come up with something decent. I could freeze them, but I have too much unlabeled crap in the freezer already.

I sent a 9-review Music Week out via Substack tonight. I should publish the real thing tomorrow.

Daily Log

Bedroom was hot (81F) when I went to bed last night, so I turned the AC on; first night I did that this year. Thermostat was set to 72F, and that's what the room measured when I woke up, around 10. We got hit by a storm after 2AM last night. Cooled down a bit. Still raining a bit. I read some. Weighed myself for the first time in a couple of weeks, and hit 225.6. Clearly headed in the wrong direction, so I should do something about that. Didn't touch Music Week yesterday, or anything for Substack publication. Mostly did Loose Tabs, which has grown pretty long. One thing I definitely need to get done today is Xgau Sez. It's slipped my mind the last couple days. Other thing on the schedule today is Laura's ear doctor appointment. She says she wants to go to three grocery stores after. Laura decided to bail on the coffee beans "impuzzible." I packed it up, trying to preserve what little we had gotten done, so if we ever open it up again, we can get back to where we were. Opened a new puzzle, and we've already made substantial progress on it.

Email (30 messages):

• HP Instant Ink: always searching for new ways to screw their customers ("to maintain the high quality of service while keeping up with rising costs"). New plan will be $1.99/month for 10 pages, plus $2.00 "per set" (which I'm guessing means 10 more pages). That's up from $1.60 a year ago. There is limited rollover, so "as of May 13, 2026 you have 30 available rollover pages"). I almost never use the printer. Most of the printer devices that Linux sets up don't work, but in recent months I've found one that does, so I've been able to print out the occasional tax document or shopping list. HP is evil.
• Sen. Roger Marshall: The Vision for America's Economic Future. Marshall spoke at a forum at the Reagan Presidential Library, alongside Scott Bessent and other Trump stooges. "Americans want an economy where hard work pays off, businesses can grow, energy is affordable, and opportunity is within reach for the next generation." Then why did they vote for these clowns?

Daily Log

Wound up mostly working on Loose Tabs yesterday. Wrote several long comments, leaving one on anti-semitism unfinished, to pick up today. Heated up to 95F yesterday. Will probably top that today. Doug is supposed to come over to work on the yard. It's pretty ragged. I got to bed late last night, and woke up after 10. Read some, then tried to go back to sleep. Came down around noon. Officially today is Music Week day, but having just released one last Thursday, I don't feel much urgency. Laura suggested giving up and boxing the coffee beans jigsaw puzzle. I'm inclined to agree. Been thinking up how to box it while preserving the work done so far. Of course, it's the easy part, so it shouldn't be too hard to regenerate, but even it didn't come easy. Laura has eye doctor on Tuesday. We'll probably do some shopping then.

Email (26 messages):

• Pussy Riot "debut album Cyka coming out June 12.

Daily Log

Did manage to go back to sleep when I first got up today, and slept nearly to noon. Machine registered eight hours, and the rest of the stats were good. Fairly content doing little to nothing yesterday. Added a few lists to the EOY aggregate. Watched Laura's film group movie, L.A. Confidential, which was pretty much as great as I remembered it (although the sex and drugs blackmail sits even worse on me than it probably did when I first saw it). Then I watched the Oklahoma City-San Antonio semifinals game — the first NBA game I've seen this season, with only the finals between San Antonio and New York remaining. I can't say as I was very impressed by either team, probably because I've only heard of the stars, and I've seen very little of them. We then watched S4E9 of The Morning Show, so one more episode to sort out their mess (and set up a fifth season).

Doubt I'll do much today. More lists are possible, but I'm running out of energy there. Loose Tabs? Books? Some other Substack post? I started by moving Loose Tabs into a temporary work file (thus emptying the old scratch file). In theory, the extra file lets me start accumulating items for a future Loose Tabs while wrapping up this one. I doubt I will do that, but

Email (14 messages):

• Project Syndicate: What Price Hormuz? (Simon Johnson/Amir Kermani); The Mismeasurement of Europe's Productivity (three authors "rebut Paul Krugman's recent claim that the gap with the US is a statistical mirage"); Is China's Confidence Justified? (Jayati Ghosh); The Pope Should Have Gone Further on AI (Daron Acemoglu); The Tech-MAGA Breakup Is Coming (Stephen Holmes); Whose Vote Will Count in America's Midterms? (Reed Galen "says that the country's redistricting wars reflect both parties' lack of a credible vision for voters"); Americans Can't Afford Trump's Economy (Jeffrey Frankel); more pieces on AI, also on China.
• Gene Seymour: Miles Lives! (article from 1997, updated).
x
• Brad Luen: Madrid's Golden Triangle of Art: A Consumer Guide.
• Substack: new free subscriber (Peter Feldstein, familiar name, but I didn't know this background: "Translator specializing in food and agriculture, with 40 years of experience studying the question of food systems and their environmental effects").
• TomDispatch: Rebecca Gordon, Endings and Beginnings.

Daily Log

Woke up at 7 something, and never really got back to sleep, so came down around 9:15. Logged 336 minutes, so 95 on the machine, which should suffice for today. I posted "But Reality Is Unscripted" to Substack, added reference to the Music Week draft, and finally posted Music Week. I think the cutoff was Thursday morning, but I've been piling up new reviews pretty quickly, hitting 20 by the time I posted Friday evening. Not sure what to do today. Main thing I keep thinking about is writing up "Representative Democracy" for Substack.

Email (8 messages):

• My Substack post: But Reality Is Unscripted. Got 8 likes; also 4 new subscribers (including Chris Monsen, Bret Julyk); I subscribed to Monsen. Stats show 1 restack, 127 views (108 email).
• Robert Wright: AI's Papal Audience
• RiotRiot: Takes by the Ocean: Nice Ratboys Finish Last, Especially Jack Harlow: Links to me re Neurosis.
• Tom Carson: Thoroughly Sod 'Em Milli.

Daily Log

I went to bed last night with Music Week still gestating, the introduction swelled to 802 words, and still nothing yet on Sonny Rollins. I'll pop the rest of that out today (if I don't get too distracted). We watched the first of a two-part Silent Witness last night, where Jack's darkly guarded brute strength erupts and he appears to have killed someone (who clearly, by American standards, had it coming, but this is British TV, so still acts like it has a conscience — and being not just fiction but TV, we can rest comfortably knowing that Jack will be exonerated, and that his passage through the hell of prison will unearth evidence that will be used to punish the even worse malefactors behind the scenes).

I woke up today with the thought that Trump has single-handedly soaked up all of the vices, the weak thinking, callous indifference, and clumsy acting out of America in the 80 years since the end of WWII. (As if he's in the penultimate season of Breaking Bad. But as this isn't fiction, let alone TV, reality is unscripted, and there is no chance he'll get a final season to make his peace with the world that took his too-readily volunteered soul.)

Of course, those vices went back much earlier, but had been temporarily masked or at least sanitized by the collective consciousness and culture of the Roosevelt years: the struggles against the great depression of capitalism, colonialism, and fascism. The triumph of WWII blessed America with unprecedented wealth and power (and ego), which (as always) made us corrupt and venal. You don't have to wait for Trump to find examples. Back when I was a child in the 1950s we were already hearing about "the ugly American." Even earlier saw the advent of "the quiet American" (as Graham Greene dubbed his CIA operative), sowing the seeds of future fiascos and wars — like the 1953 coup in Tehran that should now be seen as Act One of Trump's war against Iran.

Still, Trump is unique in American history. His great innovation is utter shamelessness, combined with a knack for acting so impulsively that he defies rational analysis. Where Clinton, Bush, and Obama struggled mightily (and desperately) to dress up America as a benevolent force in the world, Trump delights in its malignancy. And that's precisely what his followers love about him: he says and does and gets away with things they can only dream of. Most of this I can hardly comprehend, much less relate to. I only know that every fiber of his being is rotten to the core. That doesn't mean that everything he says or does is wrong. It just means that there is no way to salvage the whole.

It seems one is expected to either love or hate him. I don't hate him like I once hated Nixon, but at least I had a sense of Nixon as a human. I don't get that with Trump. He has no depth, no nuance, no sense of tragedy. He's commanded our attention, an inescapable nuisance like a humongous and indestructible horsefly or mosquito. But he's another species, impossible to relate to. For instance, I don't find anything remotely appealing about "reality TV" or "UFC cage matches." I don't lust after having a series of trophy wives, let alone cheating on them with porn stars. I don't doubt that some guys get off on that, but I don't get them either. Nor do I get the aesthetics: the gaudy displays, tacking his name on things like a dog marking territory. It's not even kitsch.

But Trump does one thing that even I appreciate: he punctures the pomposity of Obama and the Clintons and many more (there are many better reasons for despising John McCain, but Trump alone had the temerity to attack the POW martyrdom he built his career on, and the phony integrity he cloaked himself in). Of course, this only works if there is some truth to it. Razzing Democrats for palling around with rich folk works, even if part of the evidence is the Clintons attending Trump's 3rd wedding. We have lots of reasons to resent them as elites, and to dismiss their occasional shows of caring as hollow. And it really is no defense to point out that Trump's done (and will continue to do) far worse.

If Trump could apply his wit to himself and his followers, he'd be the second coming of Lenny Bruce. Of course, he can't: his ego is way too fragile to look at in the mirror, so weak he needs adoration to keep his tiny mind from collapsing into its own vacuum. He really needs his base to think they're great patriots and true Christians, because without their devotion, he's nothing. But he's bound to disappoint even them. He's promised redemption, but only delivered petty acts of revenge. He promised to "drain the swamp," but all he's done has been to turn it into his own private golf resort. He promised peace, and blundered into wars. He promised to "fix it," and he's broken everything he's touched. He brags about hiring only "the best people" and, well, look around.

How long it takes them to dump his sorry ass is still an open question — one I can't begin to answer, because the only clue that I have is the suspicion that Democrats can't see beyond nostalgia for their skewered former leaders. I'll give you one example: I saw a meme pointing out that Obama had produced a more viable deal preventing Iran from any sort of development of a nuclear weapon ("without killing anyone"), but Trump tore up that deal, and wound up launching an unnecessary and purely malicious war that (best case) will achieve far less than had alrealdy been agreed on. That true, as far as it goes, but it misses several key points:

1. Obama took Netanyahu at his word that Iran's nuclear program was directed at Israel, which was false.

2. Obama was right in understanding that Netanyahu's goals could only be achieved by an agreement with Iran, and not by threats that would only drive Iran to intensify its efforts.

3. But Netanyahu rejected that deal, because he wasn't really worried about Iran's "nuclear program," but wanted to keep Iran as an enemy, mostly to secure US funding for Israel's military. Netanyahu went on to mobilize American political support against Obama's deal, getting Democrats like Schumer and many Republicans to vote against it, and making opposition part of Trump's 2016 campaign.

4. Obama didn't put any pressure on Israel to moderate its stance against Iran, or to defuse issues with Palestinians or with Lebanon. Only the US made concessions, and very minor ones at that. (Some frozen funds were released.)

5. Obama refused to extend the negotiations to cover other issues of contention, including Iran's support for Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen. Obama kept most sanctions in place, and added more after the deal. He made no effort to normalize relations with Iran, although Iran had signaled a willingness to do so as far back as the 1990s, when Israel cranked up its anti-Iran phobia.

So sure, it's fair to blame Trump for starting this war, and it's pretty obvious no other American president (even Biden, who was silly putty in Netanyahu's hands) would have done so. But a long string of American presidents, going back to Jimmy Carter (or maybe even to Eisenhower) set up the conditions that allowed Trump to act so foolishly. But Obama looms large in that list, because he made the wrong deal, which left all of the phobias and arrogance unchecked. And he can't even claim deference to Israel has his reason for screwing up the deal, because he did the deal without Israel's blessing. His wound was self-inflicted.

Of course, what he really needed to do was to press Israel into some sort of settlement with the Palestinians that would allow a general normalization of relations across the whole Middle East. He made a couple gestures in that direction, but Netanyahu fought back, and he quickly threw in the towel. His predecessors going back to Truman had done no better, but no Israeli PM before Netanyahu had taken so much delight in bullying US presidents. (Indeed, Trump's problem is that he's even easier to kick around than Biden, Obama, Bush, or Clinton was.)

At some point in the above, it occurred to me to post what I was writing on Substack. Then it doubled in size. Time to move it over, and see what it looks like. One consequence is that I still (6:30PM) haven't written anything on Music Week (although I have added some lists to the 2025 EOY Aggregate).

Meanwhile, email (58 messages):

• Mike Konczal: I Gave (Fake?) House Testimony on Debt, Waste, and Overregulation.
• Xgau Sez: May, 2026: Ducking questions, mostly.
• Tom Carson: Lady Gabba Gabba Hey: Why the New York Times no longer maketh me lie down in gray pastures.
• Chuck Eddy: Things That Make You Go Hmmm . . .
• Brad Luen: Favorite tourist sites in Andalusia

Daily Log

Music Week organized last night, but no introduction written, so not posted. We'll do that today. Janice & Tim came over, and I heated up leftovers. We still have a bit left of everything but the corn and the chocolate cake, but the containers are much reduced.

Came down at 11 AM. Didn't read, as I had finished Breakneck last night. Not sure what is next, as I have several possibilities.

Email (32 messages):

• TomDispatch: William D Hartung, Raging Against the Machine
• Project Syndicate: The Pope Should Have Gone Further on AI (Daron Acemoglu); Keynes, Minsky, and the Economics of Uncertainty (William H Janeway); Is China's Confidence Justified? (Jayati Ghosh); The Affordability Crisis Is About More than Prices (Carolina Alves); Why Are China's Young People Fed Up? (Yi Fuxian).
• Substack: Music Week in Advance: +2 likes; +1 subscriber.
• Tom Carson: Chicken Little'e Revenge ("It's always worse when Chicken Little thinks he's the bearer of good news. Every time." Also: "To everything there is a season. Yes, even this shit.") Trump's an easy target, so why does so much of this miss its target?

Tom Carson published his screed on the Colbert finale on Facebook. I commented:

I watched it to the end, and thought it was pretty great. Admittedly, I occasionally glanced at the timer and wondered how they were going to extend this or that bit to run out the clock, but the blackout and the closing music were just about perfect. We've watched both Colbert and Kimmel on DVR regularly, but usually just for the monologues. My wife is more keenly sensitive to the politics. For me the big thing was less what the hosts said than just to see the audience so solidly supportive. Made me feel like we're not alone. I stopped watching after the second Trump election, lamenting the futility, but eventually came back, again for the audience solidarity.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, June archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 40 albums, 7 A-list

Music: Current count 46001 [45961] rated (+40), 32 [12] unrated (+20).

New records reviewed this week:

• Carsie Blanton & the Burning Hell: Everything Is Great! (2026, self-released): [sp]: A
• Carsie Blanton: The Red Album Vol. 2 (2026, self-released, EP): [sp]: A-
• Sarah Elizabeth Charles: Dawn (2024-25 [2025], Stretch/Ropeadope): [sp]: B+(**)
• Delivery: Force Majeure (2025, Heavenly): [sp]: B+(**)
• E-Dancer: E-Dancer (2025, One House): [sp]: B+(***)
• Wendy Eisenberg: Wendy Eisenberg (2026, Joyful Noise): [sp]: B
• Ella Eyre: Everything, in Time (2025, Play It Again Sam): [sp]: B+(**)
• Kim Jung Jae: Shamanism (2025, Relative Pitch): [sp]: B+(**)
• The Klezmatics: We Were Made for These Times (2025 [2026], Asphalt Tango): [sp]: B+(**)
• Chris Lake: Chemistry (2025, Black Book): [sp]: B+(***)
• Timo Lassy Trio: Live in Helsinki (2023 [2025], We Jazz): [bc]: B+(***)
• The Gareth Lockrane Big Band: Box of Tricks (2025, Whirlwind): [sp]: B+(*)
• Los Cenzontles/Taj Mahal/David Hidalgo/Gary Haleamau/Sonny Kim: Adios Ke Aloha: Waves of the Same Sea (2026, Los Cenzontles Mexican Arts Center): [sp]: B+(*)
• Taj Mahal & the Phantom Blues Band: Time (2026, Resonatin'/Thirty Tigers): [sp]: A-
• MC Yallah & Debmaster: Gaudencia (2025, Hakuna Kulala): [sp]: B+(*)
• Nicole McCabe: Color Theory (2026, Birdwatcher): [sp]: B+(***)
• Nandipha808: Who Made Who (2026, Stena Academy): [sp]: A-
• Camila Nebbia/James Banner/Max Andrzejewski: Presencia (2024 [2025], Ears & Eyes): [bc]: B+(***)
• Neurosis: An Undying Love for a Burning World (2026, Neurot): [sp]: B
• The New Gypsies: The New Gypsies Featuring Vic Juris (2017 [2026], SteepleChase): [sp]: B+(*)
• Genesis Owusu: Redstar Wu & the Worldwide Scourge (Ourness) **
• Jeremy Pelt: Our Community Will Not Be Erased (2025 [2026], HighNote): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Pizzarelli: Dear Mr. Bennett (2026, Green Hill Music): [sp]: B+(***)
• The Rumjacks: Dead Anthems (2025, Four Four Music): [sp]: B+(*)
• Dabin Ryu: Trio! (2025, Endectomorph Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• SFJazz Collective: Collective Imagery (2025, SFJazz): [sp]: B+(***)
• Dayna Stephens: Monk'D (2022 [2025], Contagious Music): [sp]: B+(***)
• Earl Sweatshirt/MIKE/Surf Gang: Pompeii//Utility (2026, 10k): [sp]: B+(**)
• Talk Show: Miss America (2023 [2025], We Jazz): [bc]: B+(**)
• Isaiah J. Thompson: The Book of Isaiah: Modern Jazz Ministry (2024 [2025], Mack Avenue): [sp]: B+(**)
• Sammy Virji: Same Day Cleaning (2025, Capitol): [sp]: B+(**)
• Marta Warelis/Ada Rave: Peel/Mondo (2024 [2025], Relative Pitch): [bc]: B+(*)
• Marta Warelis: Still Life With Lemons (2024 [2026], Relative Pitch): [bc]: B+(**)
• Ben Williams: Between Church & State (2025, Safe Space): [sp]: B+(**)
• Anthony Wilson Nonet: House of the Singing Blossoms (2025, Sam First): [sp]: B+(**)
• Winona Fighter: My Apologies to the Chief (2025, Rise): [sp]: B+(***)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Daunik Lazro/Joëlle Léandre/Paul Lovens: For Baritone Sax, Double Bass & Drumset (2013 [2026], Relative Pitch): [sp]: B+(**)
• Vardis: 100 M.P.H. '79 Revisited (1978-80 [2026], High Roller): [sp]: B+(***)

Old music:

• Gary Burton: New Vibe Man in Town (1962, RCA): [sp]: B+(**)
• Gary Burton/Sonny Rollins/Clark Terry: 3 in Jazz (1963, RCA): [sp]: B
• Evan Parker/Derek Bailey/Han Bennink: The Topography of the Lungs (1970 [2023], Otoroku): [bc]: A-
• Sonny Rollins: Sonny Boy (1956 [1961], Prestige): [sp]: A-
• Sonny Rollins: Brass/Trio (1958 [1962], Verve): [sp]: B+(***)

Grade (or other) changes:

• Black Nile: Indigo Garden (2026, Hen House Studios): [sp]: [was: B+(**)]: B+(***)
• Taj Mahal & Keb' Mo': Room on the Porch (2025, Concord Jazz): [sp]: [was: B+(***)] A-
• Sonny Rollins: Nucleus (1975, Milestone): [sp]: [was: B-]: B+(*)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Bobby Bradford/Mark Dresser/Hafez Modirzadeh: Sonic House Reunion (NoBusiness) [05-01]
• Marion Brown: Live in Europe 1968 & 1972 (NoBusiness) [05-01]
• Anthony Caceres: Let's Take a Trip (Jig in G) [02-27]
• Daniel Carter/Sabir Mateen/William Parker/Lou Grassi: Keeping It in Context (1996, NoBusiness) [05-01]
• Columbia Icefield: A Silence Opens (Out of Your Head) [05-29]
• Michael Dease Big Band: Return Trajectory (Origin) [06-19]
• George: Looking for Consonance (Out of Your Head) [05-08]
• Brad Goode Quintet: Live Your Dream (Origin) [06-19]
• Rafael Greco: Versos Bajo Mi Sombra/Verses Under My Shadow (Blue Canoe) [04-17]
• Andy Haas: Messianic Time (Resonant Music) [05-14]
• Jon Hamar: Música Callada (Origin Classical) [06-19]
• Carolyn Lee Jones: Eklektika: Jazz Retro Pop Bossa Nova (Catn'round Sound) [06-08]
• Sunny Murray/Sabu Toyozumi: Sun's Blessings (1999, NoBusiness) [05-01]
• Miles Okazaki: Boomtown (Pi) [06-26]
• Ben Patterson: Stretch (Origin) [06-19]
• Kemuel Roig: Both Sides Now (Life in Music) [05-15]
• Jeff Rupert Quartet: Sea Spell (Rupe Media) [06-29]
• Scott Sadlon: Songs From Thin Air (Buddha Boy) [01-28]
• Schapiro 17: Best Laid Plans (Summit) [05-08]
• Tyshawn Sorey: Members . . . Don't (Pi) [05-29]

Daily Log

Dinner was pretty successful. My timing was just about perfect, but two scares at the end: when I pulled the bison out of the oven, it was dry and appeared to be totally burnt; meanwhile, the sweet potatoes were distinctly undercooked. The bison just needed a good stir, although after I had scraped out the meat, the dutch oven appeared to be hopelessly crusted. It's still soaking as I write this. The sweet potatoes needed more work. I cranked the oven up to 425F (recipe had called for 400F for 30 minutes; I usually do 425F for sweet potatoes or pretty much any root vegetables, and often longer), poured some water into the pan, and loosely covered it with aluminum foil. It worked, and when I checked 10 minutes later, they were perfect.

Next step is to write this up for Facebook. Working on that, before I got distracted. [PS: Link here.]

Email (38 messages):

I'm finally finding myself thinking a bit about Sonny Rollins, who died yesterday (95). Trying to figure out what else I can listen to. (I started with Sonny Boy (1956), then Brass/Trio (1958). I'm adding things to the still unpublished Music Week. Occurs to me that maybe I should pull together all of my previous Rollins reviews, so I brought up my "book." Found this quote there: "If you tried to simplify jazz sax to a model as simple as a tree, the trunk would be [Coleman] Hawkins, with Sonny Rollins standing on his shoulders. Everyone else is just a branch."

Spent much of the day thinking about Rollins, playing things, but it eventually became clear that collecting the old writing was going to be a big job, requiring a lot of rework. So I moved on to Music Week. Ran the cutover, but noticed an anomaly, as the number of graded records dropped. Took me several hours to figure out why, and to fix the problem. (A chunk of jazz-40s got deleted accidentally, wiping out Dexter Gordon's artist entry, and transferring several of his albums to Paul Gonsalves. I need better tools for comparing files to backup copies on the server.) I finally ran the cutover around 11:30 PM. Too late to post anything tonight, so that will wait until tomorrow.

Janice and Tim came over for leftovers, so we cleared out most of what we had. Dutch oven cleaned up fairly well after an overnight soak.

Daily Log

Went to bed at my normal 3AM. Woke up a bit after 8. Tried going back to sleep, to little avail. Came down at 9:45. I have a lot of cooking to do today. Yesterday I debated rushing Music Week out, then it occurred to me that I could pick out a few reviews, and send them to my Substack list. At this point, I care more about my few known subscribers than the anonymous blog readers, whoever they may be. Why not give them a break? Especially as I only had one May post, and the monthly stats have been crushing all year. I spent an hour writing up a cursory introduction, then picked out eight reviews: one A, three A-, four lower grades including a B for the year's top metal album. I didn't break the sections up between new-new, new-old, and old-old, but the split was 6-1-1.

I introduced a system in the staging directory where my temporary drafts are named { T1, T2, . . . }, then the pieces are assigned sequence numbers only when I'm ready to publish. I came up with this for blog posts, as I'm slow working on a books post, but the old system (temp files called "next" and "books") was proving unwieldy and confusing. One thing this lets me do is to stage multiple books posts at the same time. I have a lot of backlog, which I need to flush, but a full year after the last books post, my first one should hit the priority books. I can then follow that up with one or more lower-priority posts. It took a small programming change for the blog files, but just links here.

Menu for today, with notes on what I need to do, in roughly what order. This is from memory, and may well change as I look at the cookbooks. But I have a fairly good idea what I'm doing (I think):

1. Braised Bison Colorado: First because it takes so long: 3.5 hours in a 375F oven, but first I need to make the Colorado sauce (boil chile peppers and onion, run it through the blender, strain it), and cube and brown the bison. It should be thawed by now. The sauce is going to be hotter than I would like. I may cut it down a bit, but I didn't really care for the other bison recipes (jerky, meatballs), and I'll have other dishes. After browning, I add the sauce and beef stock, then stick it in the oven, and that's all.
2. Grilled Corn: I have the small chunks of corn on the cob, thawed. I'm going to try to "grill" them in a cast iron skillet, with a little oil. I will eventually add a lime-cilantro sauce, so I may prep that ahead of time. In any case, I figure I'll warm up the grilled corn come serving time, with the sauce.
3. Charred Pineapple Salsa: I have a package of pineapple spears. I'll throw them into the cast iron skilled once the corn is done. Recipe also calls for charring 1-2 jalapenos, so I'll do that as well. I can assemble the salsa later.
4. Roasted Sweet Potatoes: Peel and cube, then mix with maple syrup and sage leaves, and pile into a baking dish. I can pop that into the oven to come out just before service. I think it's 400F for 30 minutes. I'm going to use the gas oven for the bison, leaving the electric free for this.
5. Steamed White Fish in Corn Husks: Husks have been soaking overnight. They're disposable anyway. I have two 1-lb packages of fish filets (one trout, one branzino), thawed out over night. I need to wrap each one up in a corn husk, with some garlic, a bay leaf, and some lime slices. Recipe calls for oil, but I'm inclined to use butter (same for the corn). Recipe includes a tomato salsa, but suggests the pineapple as a substitute. I probably won't bother with the tomato, but I do have some if I have the time. I'm a bit worried that it's not all going to fit in the steamer, so I may have to do two batches. The steaming itself is 15 minutes, and on its own burner, so that shouldn't be a big problem.
6. Tomatillo Salad: I cut all of the ingredients last night, so all I need to do here is to make the dressing, and toss it together. Mostly lime and cilantro.
7. Dandelion Greens Salad: Calls for pickled blueberries, which I did last night. No dadelions available, so I'll substitue arugula. Not sure what else goes into it. Another vinaigrette.
8. Mixed Greens with Prickly Pear: Similar to the DeSpain Watercress Salad recipe, and probably better for our purposes. I julienned jicama, green apple, and onion last night, and put it in a bag with some lemon juice. For greens I have arugula and mustard greens. I may emphasize the latter, as the arugula will mostly be in the other salad. Recipe also calls for pecans and queso fresco (or feta; I have cotijo). Big thing here is the prickly pear dressing. I don't have the juice called for, but I do have syrup, which is probably workable.
9. I have leftover cake and ice cream for dessert. The presentation is sloppy, but there is a lot of it.

10:30 now. I'll get to work after breakfast. Seems to me like this should be pretty manageable, but everything is taking longer than it used to, so I wouldn't be surprised to find myself up against the 6:00 deadline.

Email (30 messages):

• M6.7 earthquake in Chile.
• Sonny Rollins died, at 95: from Terri Hinte, also DownBeat; also Substack posts about Rollins from Michael Steinman, Gene Seymour.
• Replacement copy of The Return of Resentment shipped.
• Substack stats for "Music Week in Advance: 5 likes, 0 comments, 0 restacks, 0 new subscribers, 123 views (107 from email).
• Wichita Public Library: 2 books renewed, until June 12.
• TomDispatch: Robert Lipsyte, To Understand Where America Is Heading, Read Sports
• Tom Carson: Alt-History 109 (Prof. Kinbote)
• I uploaded a plate photo from today's meal.

Update 2:35: Bison Colorado in the 375F oven now. Needs 3.5 hours, so 5:45? Corn grilled, and I brushed a little lime-cilantro butter on it. I'll warm it up later, in more of the butter. Pineapple also grilled. I'll probably make the salsa next. Sweet potatoes are cut and dressed, ready to go into 400F oven for 30 minutes, so about 5:15. Salads are going to be a little ad hoc, but that's mostly making dressings and choosing greens. The serious cutting is mostly done. That leaves the fish as the remaining issue. The corn husks are soaked, and the steamer is set up. Big unknown is one or two batches, but worst case is 35 minutes cooking time. [PS: Yes, two batches.]

Daily Log

I felt kind of queasy last night. I went up shortly after TV, read a bit, then went sleep, not much after 1 AM. I woke up twice during the night, reading some, then finally got up at 12:15 PM. Logged 546 minutes. I feel better as I'm writing this. Most likely explanation was hyperglycemia from the cakes I made for Rannfrid's birthday. I just had one thin slice of each, but did a lot of scraping and licking along the way. The cakes were about half eaten at the party. I left an extra quarter of each for Rannfrid and "the house," and brought the rest home. By that point, the slices weren't sturdy enough to stand on their own — I had overcompensated for my habit of overbaking so they came out soft, and for the cannoli cake a bit underdone. I took a 9x13 cake pan, filled it with crumbled slices and loose bits, covered it, and put it in the refrigerator.

I spent most of my overnight ordeal dreading making dinner on Tuesday. As I'm feeling better now, I might as well go ahead and do it, but I may dial back my expectations. I need to figure that out, then go shopping, this afternoon. Cutting out the grill will be a big help. Google suggests grilling corn in a cast iron pan. Once grilled, I figure I can make the sauce in a regular skillet, and reheat the corn in it. Maybe I'll try making the pineapple salsa with cut pineapple in the same cast iron pan. Main dish will be a chunk of bison roast I have in freezer. It just goes in a pot to braise (The Colorado sauce has a lot of chilis, so that will have to be moderated.) I might do the steamed fish in corn husks. I need to see what fish I have in the freezer. Beyond that, the salads I skipped in the original DeSpain dinner worked out nicely, and can easily be reprised. Arugula worked reasonably well in place of dadelions. I think I can leave the corn out of the tomatillo salad. I did both squash and sweet potatoes last time, which were near cousins. I'll just do the sweet potatoes this time, as they came out better. I don't think the fry bread is worth the trouble. Aside from DeSpain, I have a second native American cookbook I can consult. It covers the continent more broadly, but there is considerable overlap. I probably don't need to pick up any more recipes, but I'll take another loook at it.

I may or may not do Music Week today. This is the last Monday in May, so doing so would add some extra overhead, in that I'd also need to set up the June Streamnotes file, and in theory do the index accounting for May (but that's hypothetical, given that the last one I've done was December, 2025). I have +35 albums this week, +2 unrated, and two packages I haven't opened yet. Running the cutoff is easy enough, and I don't really have to write any introduction. Not sure yet what to do.

Email (20 messages):

• Project Syndicate: Slug line is from the Yanis Varoufakis post: NATO Must Die. Other items of possible interest: A Cold Shower for the AI Mania (Raghuram G Rajan); Keynes, Minsky, and the Economics of Uncertainty (William H Janeway); The Myth of the Deserving Billionaire (Teresa Ghilarducci); The Affordability Crisis Is About More Than Prices (Carolina Alves); The Root of Today's Global Imbalances (Lee Jong-Wha); Trumponomics Is Failing on Growth (Simon Johnson); Why Are China's Young People Fed Up? (Yi Fuxian); Iran Is Pressing Its Strategic Advantage (Carla Norrlöf); Why Trump Sued Himself (Stephen Holmes: sees the "settlement" "not as corruption but as a public performance of impunity"); The Gulf's Post-OPEC Order (Rabah Arezki/Tarik M Yousef); The Coming Vote for Europe's Soul (Kevin Hjortshøj O'Rourke, on "an odious trade agreeement with the Trump administration").
• TomDispatch: Jasper Craven, A Hell of a Secretary of War
• Tom Carson: Pipe Smoke and Mirrors: The resistible rise and rot of Trump Sovieticus. A fairly desperate attempt to recast Trump-Hitler as Trump-Stalin, using Bertrand Russell as a fulcrum, but like Stalin himself, never quite figures out how to incorporate all that Marxian revolutionary spirit into the Russian bureaucracy and militarism. Still, those historical analogies weigh heavily on Trump, whose most conspicuous features is his ineptitude.
• Allen Lowe: Hello I Must Be Going: Some kind of sign off, although he's promising to continue posting a few pieces (including "opinion pieces") and other "reparations" for the paid subscriptions.

Daily Log

Slept until 11:45. Started writing about the cakes at the end of yesterday's entry. Birthday party starts at 5, so we should leave here around 4:30 to deliver them just before everything kicks off. That leaves me less than four hours to assemble and finish them. Should be sufficient, but we've been running into a lot of Murphy lately. First thing I need to do is to take the frosting/filling out of the refrigerator. Cannoli filling isn't quite a firm as I would like. Next will be to make the rum/orange sauce. Then I need to unwrap the chocolate cakes, stack and frost them. Then I can make the ganache, let it cool a bit, and pour it over the cake. I have some mini Reeses Pieces I can use as a garnish. They also suggest piping the leftover peanut frosting around the top. Doubt I'll do that.

Before I finish the chocolate, I'll probably start on the cannoli cake. Critical step is to slice the two cakes horizontally, making four layers. I have a saw to do that, but it will depend on how well the cakes hold up, and handling the layers is going to be difficult. Each layer will be topped with filling (supposedly one cup each), and dotted with chocolate chips. I then need to spread the rest around the sides, and dot them with more chocolate chips. I'm thinking I'll need tweezers for that step, so that will be time-consuming. I'm worried about how room temp will affect the filling/frosting. So still a fair amount of uncertainty here.

Email (10 messages):

• Tom Carson: Colbert Grapes.

Daily Log

Went to bed early last night, before Laura even. I went shopping yesterday, getting supplies to make cakes today. Had to go to a second store, as the first was out of mascarpone. Rained hard while I was in the store. I did laundry last night. We watched episode eight of Ballard, then Laura wanted to "check out" Widow's Bay. We watched the first episode a while back, and I hated it. I agreed, but hated this second episode more actively, and walked out midway, going down to fetch the laundry. By the time I was done, I was too tired to do anything else, so I just went to bed. Read a bit in the China book (Breakneck).

Email (8 messages):

• Robert Wright: This Week's TACO. Trump was evidently prepared to sign a weak order on regulating AI (allowing security agencies to sniff around before product release), but was talked out of it by "Silicon Valley accelerationists" (including Bezos and Musk).
• Mike Konczal: Discussing The Wage Standard with Arin Dube: author of a book of that title. Regarding post-pandemic inflation, Konczal says the vidence "fits a supply-shock story, where workers are trying to catch up to all the stuff that's happened and they follow this mimic pattern as the supply shock comes off." Ergo, rising wages in a tight labor market wasn't to blame.
• Tom Carson: Lurch, Morticia, and John Fetterman.
• Tom Carson: Frankenride 6.
• Laura sent me a link (better link) to a Doug Henwood podcast (audio only). Refers to recent pieces lamenting American decline (failures viz. Iran and China) by Robert Kagan and Max Boot. Interviews Laleh Khalili and Mouin Rabbani. Khalili says "America is the most malignant empire in human history," while Israel "is completely rabid."

I need to bake my cakes today:

• Cannoli Cake (Marcellina in Cucina)
• Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake

Daily Log

Woke up around 9, but went back to sleep, and woke up an hour and a half later from a weird dream. Came down around 11:30. Still cool outside.

Email (40 messages):

• Chuck Eddy: The Topical Song.

I've added some jazz ballots to my EOY aggregate. Given that all of the records that got votes in the Jazz Critics Poll were already listed, that's been relatively easy. Main effect is to shift the top jazz records up in the standings. That's probably not a good thing per se, but should make the results more consistent with past years. I've also added the EOY list of Jason Gross. He picks up a lot of records no one else gets. In past years I've found some remarkable albums there, but not so much recently. The first few I've sampled haven't broken out of the high B+ ranks. I also mean to add Christgau's Dean's List, which is often the last thing I add, so seems mandatory here (although his grades are already heavily weighted). I'm spreading out a little bit, but don't expect much. One such addition has been the Bandcamp Daily essential records lists.

I needed to reboot the computer to finish installing a software update. So now I need to get back to where I was before the reboot. One thing I had just started was to create stub files for An Overview of the Website and An Overview of the Writings. The former starts with an ls -lRt of the whole website. I can then sort through that list and decide what I want to document, and where. My short-term goal is to write a letter I can send to many of the people in my address book. I'd like to encourage them to get in touch, by offering a personal info update. Much of what I have to share involves writings on the website(s). Rather than clutter up the letter, I figure one link to the overview(s) should suffice, and offer somewhere I can do a better job of keeping up with.

Daily Log

Went to bed early, and slept better. Got up at 10:30, but it's 12:20 as I write this. I finally broke down and cleared my desk off. Found an old plastic cup to collect long things: pens, pencils, chopsticks, two screwdrivers, a steak knife. Loose paper got piled up to deal with later (some already trashed). Many more piles of crap lying around, some augmented with former desk stuff, but it's a start. I'm still missing two albums in the pending queue, and found one loose CD without its jacket, so mysteries abound.

Unclear what to do today, other than process May CG. I've been playing albums from it, an improvement over picking out missed items from the DownBeat ballot. Jigsaw puzzle work is so slow I'm not motivated to put much into it. I continue to have problems with Spotify. Web interface worked until I brought up the Earl Sweatshirt album, which it refused to play. Listening to it now via Bandcamp.

Email (33 messages):

• Christgau website correction: s/Jane Weidlin/Jane Wiedlin/, goes back to one review from 1986, also wrong in book.
• TomDispatch: A Global War on Children. "In the Trumpian Age, Every Accusation Is Also a Confession."
• Sen. Roger Marshall: Boeing, Beef, and Beans: President Trump Delivers Big Wins for Kansas.
• Medicare: Stay Healthy with Dr. Oz.

I added the Christgau CG to his website. When I went to update the server, I got a disk space error. When I looked at the server, I found two very large error_log files, so I truncated them. Before doing so, I noticed that most of the lines were complaints about a deprecated function in PHP (strftime). It was being used to generate a RSS feed, so I worked on that. The suggested fix was to use date() instead, but the encoding was different, so I asked Google AI to translate. It did, but not perfectly, so I wound up having to recheck it all by hand. I also got rid of a couple of database backups, and I cleaned out the mail inbox.

I looked later, and found more error_log complaints. In particular, I was getting an exception on a SQL query. It seemed to be working, and I couldn't find where the complaint was generated, so I asked Google AI what was wrong with my query. It said my query was ok for "basic MySQL," but a better query would specify "INNER JOIN" and it showed me how. While I understand the difference between inner and outer joins, I've never used the join operator, so it would have taken me hours to research this problem. The new code works fine. There's a good chance this should be done elsewhere.

I also found a complaint about stripslashes(). The suggested code fix strikes me as stupid, but it too seems to work. Evidently functions which operate on strings no longer assume that null is equal to "", so you have to cast null values to turn them into empty strings (the code to do this is far from intuitive: ?? ''). I'm finding similar problems with other string functions, like htmlentities(), as well as warnings about unset array indexes.

Daily Log

Slept ok. Came down at 11:25. Weight up one pound, so I'm not adjusting correctly. We are going out to dinner tonight, so that won't help. But Janice & Tim are leaving for Olympia next week. I figured I might make dinner, but Laura liked the idea of going out better. They agreed on Carrabba's, which Janice has never been to. (We've been dozens of times, but I think only once in the last year.) I am scheduled to cook for Mike & Gretchen next Tuesday. We'll reprise the DeSpain cookbook menu, which they missed the original of. I have a bison roast left in the freezer, also some corn to grill. I may do the Mexican chocolate cake again.

Spent considerable time figuring out what went wrong with Christgau's "Dean's List: 2025." I have notes, originally meant as research for writing a Substack piece on albums he missed. Not sure I can (or should) use much of what I figured out. Basically, he missed a lot of stuff, and doesn't care. That can happen when you have expectations to live up to. He has a new CG out today, so I'll process that before updating the website. I also spent some time adding jazz critic ballots to the 2025 EOY Aggregate. No real good reason. Just something I felt like doing, but it reminds me both of what I like and hate about that task. While I may only briefly mention "Dean's List: 2025" I should write a bit about my EOY Aggregate. The main point is to showcase reviews of good albums that escaped the notice of pretty much everyone else, so I need to explain the method behind the madness.

Other thing I did a bit of work on was a books post. I made very little progress. One problem is that I already have a ton of leftover entries, which are quickly being overwhelmed by new books, each of which take a fair chunk of time just to note and sum up. The upside is that I learn a hell of a lot each time I do this. But it's going to take a lot of time, and these days it's hard to tell what that's worth.

The Spotify app stopped working (specifically, search ceased to work). AI diagnostics were useless. I tried to complain, but I have little confidence in that. I was able to run the website interface, so I'm listening to Carsie Blanton now.

Email (25 messages):

• Robert Christgau: Consumer Guide: May, 2026. A+ for Blanton. Two Taj Mahal albums, one new and one I need to recheck. An African comp from 2008 I'm on record at A-. Two quasi-jazz albums I've heard and wasn't much impressed with. Aside from one Taj Mahal, nothing really looks like 2025 catch up. I need to process this today or tomorrow, adding it to the database as well as the website, then upload both.
• Vox has been bought up by Lupa Systems, owned by James Murdoch.
• I ordered two books and a nonslip bathtub mat from Amazon.

I linked to Blanton both on Bluesky and Facebook.

I've come up with a new strategy for handling the book roundup. I've created two blog archive files, t1 and t2. That way I can work on two book roundup posts simultaneously, without committing a blog sequence number to either. Those titles are designed to be recycled for future projects. The lack of a leading number will probably keep them from appearing in the blog roll (although I need to check that). I figure the first one will be my high priority books list. It's been a year since my last compilation, so I expect there are lots of primo books to mention. The second I want to use to clear out the leftover entries from last year, plus other lower-priority books.

It's possible I could come with several priority book posts. If that's the case, I'll publish t1, then start another under that same name. So t2 will always be the mop-up file, the last in this series of Book Roundups. (I think at one point in the past I knocked out four such posts in quick succession.)

Daily Log

Slept better, just under six hours, but AHI dropped down to 1.4, and average leak was 0.2. Security system was beeping when I got up, so I had to turn it off. We had another brief power outage overnight. Computer was ok, but some of the unprotected electronics need their clocks reset. We got quite a bit of rain when the storm finally blew through. It was done by 1AM, when I took the garbage cans out. Some leaf litter suggests we got some wind. I didn't notice any hail. Much cooler today, 44F[*] when I came down, about 10:30. Music Week is up, so I don't have to deal with that. Hanna is done. I'm feeling ripped off, but that's one more thing off the checklist. Trying to schedule a dinner for later this week. Other than that, I'm pretty free.

[*] Turns out the weather machine had been changed to measure dew point instead of actual temperature. When I corrected this, around 3:30PM, the 46F became 56F. So still cool, but not cold.

I started taking notes on Christgau's Dean's List. I have a Substack file open for that. I won't be sending the notes out, but they'll provide backup for whatever I do send. I have it sequenced after a Loose Tabs summary, which is barely started. So I can fiddle with both of those, and see what (if anything) comes out. I finished Acemoglu & Johnson, aside from the interesting-looking bibliographic essay, which not only references sources but reiterates key concepts. Good book. I've started Dan Wang: Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future. I've long waited for a book on China that isn't full of shit. The usual problem is that we tend to measure China on our own yardstick, which we don't understand very well. So the main thing is to see China on its own terms, without totally losing a critical eye. This introductory quote strikes me as fairly well balanced:

It is almost uncanny how much the United States and China have been complementary of each other. It was no accident tha the two countries established, for a few decades, an economic partnership that worked tremendously well for American consumers and Chinese workers. But on a political level, these two sytems are a study in contrasts. While the United States reflects the virtues of pluralism and protection of individuals, China revealed the advantages and perils that come from moving quickly to achieve rapid physical improvements.

Over the past four decades, China has grown richer, more technologically capable, and more diplomatically assertive abroad. China learned so well from the United States that it started to beat America at its own game: capitalism, industry, and harnessing its people's restless ambitions. If you want to appreciate what Detroit felt like at its peak, it's probablly better to experience that in Shenzhen than anywhere in the United States.

As China emulated America's past successes, the US government got busy undermining its own strengths. A procedure-obsessed left conspired with a thoughtlessly destructive right to constrain the government. Neither the left nor the right allows the state to deliver essential goods expected by the public. The Biden administration may have ushered through historic bills on industrial poicy, but executive agencies were so obsessed with procedural concerns that little building actually took place before voters reelected Donald Trump, who has threatened to cancel many of these projects. The United States is still a superpower that is able to outclass China on many dimensions. But it is also in the grips of an ineffectual state where people are increasingly concerned with safeguarding a comfortable way of life.

Of course, his left isn't the real left, but point taken. When Social Security and Medicare were passed, they went into effect almost immediately, so the benefits were quickly tangible. But it took 3-5 years to put Obamacare into effect, so its value wasn't readily apparent (and probably still isn't, partly due to sabotage, partly blunted ambition, and also because it mostly served to arrest or slow down adverse trends, like exclusion for pre-existing conditions. The "abundance agenda" crowd is one reaction to this. Many on the left are very suspicious of Klein/Thompson, and how their arguments have been taken up by centrists, but Mamdani was quick to embrace their logic, and put it to work, recognizing that the left needs to actually deliver, not just criticize.

Email (24 messages):

• 4DaRecord yum code: Souchal/Madeira/Parrinha: Parcours D'Impulsions, downloaded.
• TomDispatch: Is the US Heading Toward a Hard Landing? What Can North Korea Tell Us About America's Failure? Engelhardt is calling this "America's Flight 93 Moment."
• Scott Galloway had the audience. Here's what he came for.

Daily Log

Bad night sleeping. Score 85, despite clearing 344 minutes, the AHI number was an astronomical 9.1 (target is under 5.0; I usually get close to 2.0), with a 6.2 average leak (90% leak 25.2). I spent much of the night fighting leaks, tightening up the mask, a surprise after swapping in a new cushion just a couple days ago. Of course, Laura's night was far worse. Dog may have had a rough time, too, but is more stoical about it. Hanna coming over today. Just got a call (11:40AM) that they're heading over, so I'll have to deal with them before breakfast. Other than that, nothing much today. I finished adding the link numbers to the Dean's List, which let me do a pretty comprehensive error check. I caught a few problems with the database entries, and fixed more in the file.

Hanna (Chance) came over to tune up the air conditioner. Took a bit over an hour. Charged me $360 for the annual (two-visit) service contract. That's more than 50% up from last year. I was already thinking we're paying too much, and I should consider switching to someone else. Fortunately, we can afford to grin and bear it. But as someone who thinks capitalism is becoming increasingly predatory, I can add this to my evidence pile. Finally got to breakfast after 1PM. Expecting storms today. I should go ahead and knock out Music Week.

Email (29 messages):

• TomDispatch: The President of Peace Makes War on the Planet.
• The Intercept: How Trump's New Counterterrorism Strategy Puts You at Risk (Nick Turse).
• Joe Levy: approves my edits to Dean's List (one label change, done).
• Tom Carson: Trump And What Army? As Memorial Day looms, let's take stock of how POTUS values America's military: "As so often with the Trump maladministration, unbelievably crass boorishness operates to mask sickening depredation."
• Hanna Heating and Air Conditioning invoice for $306.00.
• New Substack subscriber: Lee Rice Epstein (back to 100?).

I tried making dinner. I had some peanut sauce left over from the Indonesian birthday dinner I wanted to use. I recalled a recipe for fried catfish in peanut sauce, and picked up some nuggets on Sunday. I dredged them in a combination of corn, potato, and chickpea flours, with some curry spices, and fried them. Then I scooped out half a cup of peanut sauce, added a can of coconut milk, brought that to a boil, then added the fish. Laura thought it was weird. I cooked some rice, then recooked it with onion and bacon and some chicken stock to soften it up a bit. I sauteed zucchini and red bell pepper, and two eggs, and added them in, along with ham, scallions, and cashews. Not a great dinner, but just the two of us, so no damage.

Various things left me feeling exceptionally blasé. I wrote up a fairly brief intro to Music Week, and thought I'd post it before the long-awaited storm finally hit (around 10PM). As I was getting ready, the power went out, momentarily but it disrupted things. Internet went down, then up, down, and up again. I did manage to post it. Watched some TV weather, which led into Kimmel, in real time for once. I worked a bit on the jigsaw, putting 4 pieces in. Given the difficulty of the puzzle, that counted as a good start. It's an out-of-focus picture of coffee beans, each more or less one piece in size. Superimposed is a magnifying class, which has an outline and brings the beans into focus, covering maybe 10% of the puzzle. The in-focus pieces are relatively easy to sort out, so I did them and the magnifying class first, while Laura tried to do the frame. After several days, I started working on the frame as well, and got it reasonably complete a day or two ago. The four pieces included 1 (of 2 open) in-focus, 1 attached to magnifying glass frame, and 2 attached to the border. It's going to be a very long slog.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, May archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 39 albums, 2 A-list

Music: Current count 45961 [45922] rated (+39), 12 [18] unrated (-6).

New records reviewed this week:

• Steven Bernstein/Scotty Hard: ResoNation Trio/Ultra Resonance (2025 [2026], Royal Potato Family): [cd]: B+(***) [06-05]
• Jane Ira Bloom/Brian Shankar Adler: Once Like a Spark (2025, Adhyâropa): [sp]: B+(***)
• Dawn Clement: Dear Ms. Dearie (2025 [2026], Origin): [cd]: B+(**) [05-22]
• Braxton Cook: Not Everyone Can Go (2025, Nettwerk): [sp]: B+(*)
• Chick Corea: Forever Yours: The Farewell Performance (2020 [2025], Candid): [sp]: B+(**)
• George Cotsirilos: In the Wee Hours (2017-25 [2026], OA2): [cd]: B+(*) [05-22]
• Sylvie Courvoisier Trio: Éclats - Live in Europe (2025 [2026], Intakt): [sp]: B+(***)
• Theo Croker/Sullivan Croker: Play (2023 [2025], ACT Music): [sp]: B
• Amalie Dahl's Dafnie Extended: Live at Moldejazz (2025 [2026], Sonic Transmissions): [bc]: B+(*)
• Daoud: Ok (2025, ACT Music): [sp]: B+(*)
• Django Festival Allstars: Evolution (2026, Motéma): [sp]: B+(*)
• Gabriel Espinosa: The Brazilian Project (2022-25 [2026], Origin): [cd]: B+(*) [05-22]
• Christine Fawson: It Could Happen to You (2026, self-released): [cd]: B+(***) [06-01]
• Michael Formanek: New Digs (2025 [2026], Intakt): [sp]: B+(***)
• David Friedman/Tony Miceli: Glow (2019 [2026], SteepleChase): [sp]: B
• Gordon Grdina/Jim Black: Martian Kitties (2025, 577): [sp]: B+(**)
• Gordon Grdina/Russ Lossing: Turnpike (2026, Attaboygirl): [sp]: B+(**)
• Gordon Grdina's Nomad Trio: Ash (2026, Attaboygirl): [bc]: B+(**)
• Sven-Åke Johansson With Pierre Borel/Seymour Wright/Joel Grip: Two Days at Café Oto (2025, Otoroku): [bc]: B+(***)
• Aubrey Johnson: The Lively Air (2025 [2026], Greenleaf Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Aubrey Johnson/Helen Sung/Dave Douglas: Lives of the Saints: Portraits in Song With Words by David Hadju (2025, Sunnyside): [sp]: B+(*)
• David Lord: Way Over the Rainbow (2025, Cloud Ear): [sp]: B+(*)
• Andrew Moorhead: Mirage (2025 [2026], OA2): [cd]: B+(***) [05-22]
• Azuka Moweta and His Anioma Brothers Band of Africa: Kenechukwu (2026, Palenque): [sp]: A-
• Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra: Ellington Masterworks (2024 [2026], MCG Jazz): [cd]: B+(***) [06-12]
• Vaiano's Paisanos: Vaiano's Paisanos (2026, Jalopy): [sp]: B+(***)
• Vaiano's Paisanos: Viaino's Paisanos Presents Rachel Meirs & Van Burchfield (2025, Jalopy): [bc]: B+(**)
• Don Was and the Pan-Detroit Ensemble: Groove in the Face of Adversity (2025, Mack Avenue): [sp]: B+(***)
• Rich Willey: Laid Back Vol. 1 (2025 [2026], Boptism): [cd]: B+(*) [05-30]

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Ray Charles: No One Does It Like . . . Ray Charles! (1962-65 [2025], Tangerine): [sp]: A-
• Duke Ellington: Copenhagen 1964 (1964 [2026], Storyville): [bc]: A-
• Bill Evans: Portraits at the Penthouse: Live in Seattle (1966 [2025], Resonance): [sp]: B+(**)
• Benny Golson: Gone With Golson (1959 [2025], Craft): [sp]: B+(***)
• Morphine: Bootleg Detroit [Deluxe Edition] (1994 [2025], Rykodisc/Rhino): [sp]: B+(**)
• Lester Young: Lester Leaps In: Live at Birdland 1951-1952 (1951-52 [2025], Liberation Hall): [bc]: B+(***)

Old music:

• Azuka Moweta and His Anioma Brothers Band: Ekobe Global (2025, Palenque): [sp]: B+(***)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Ballister + Luke Stewart: Clocking the Wheel (Aerophonic) [07-10]
• Maya De Vitry: All My Faith (Mad Maker Studios) [07-24]
• Charles Downs Quartet: Inner (ESP-Disk') [05-15]
• Entropic Hop: The Quest for the Normal Is the Death of the Self (ESP-Disk') [05-15]

Daily Log

Another rough night sleeping. Got up, read the next-to-last chapter of Acemoglu/Johnson (on "breaking democracy"), and came down around 10:30. Laura needed to watch Nashville for her film discussion group, so I agreed to watch it with her, but she couldn't get the subtitles working on the TV, so she wound up watching it on her computer, leaving me out. This is the third Altman film they've done recently, and I can't say as I've much enjoyed any of them. I finished catching up with the Christgau CG database. No May column yet, so presumably there should be one this week. I've sent him proofs, and other messages, but rarely hear anything back from him. One idea is for me to write something on Substack that comments on his Dean's List, then include capsule reviews for some albums he never reviewed. Not sure when to do that within the series of pieces I'm contemplating (most immediately: Loose Tabs exec summary, DownBeat poll critique; less urgently: comfort food [from January], gerrymandering, Trump top-ten).

Laura has her film group today. After that, she wanted to go to grocery store, but looks like we'll get hit with a storm between 4-6PM. I don't have any real plans. Hot again today. Jigsaw puzzle is nothing but a bunch of blurry coffee beans. Laura usually puts the border together, before I start organizing the pieces and making inroads, but she was stumped, and I wound up working on the border the last several days. I finally came up with something that looks plausible, giving us a border of 36x28 pieces. There's one interior section with the outline of a magnifying glass, where the beans under it are in focus. That was fairly easy to sort out, so I did it while waiting for Laura to figure out the border. Once that was done, I started working on the border. We have different theories on what to do from here.

Email (8 messages):

• Project Syndicate: Subject line: "America's superpower suicide." That comes from an article by Timothy Snyder. Also possibly interesting: How I Became a Manufacturing Skeptic (Dani Rodrik); How Russia Lost Friends and Global Influence (Nina L Krushcheva); Who Will Solve the AI Productivity Puzzle? (Robin Rivaton).
• Christian Iszchak: An Acute Case.
• Brad Luen: Semipop Life.

Daily Log

Tired last night. Went upstairs shortly after 2AM, leaving the last in the Mahjongg series unsolved (after 15 minutes; first thing this morning was to restart it, solving it in reasonable time). Came down at 10:30. Still have 60 pages (plus the bibliographic essay) in Acemoglu/Johnson. I wasn't expecting so much on AI, but what's there is good, and builds upon my recent reads of Doctorow and Wu. Woke up thinking about the Trump top ten piece. One thought is that it's important that the top ten not be ranked. They form an interrelated cluster, so the list order should track their relations. Where you start is somewhat arbitrary, but climate change might be a good place to start. It's big and obvious, but also introduces at least four recurrent themes:

1. The primacy of faith over science.
2. Abuse of government and power.
3. The central focus on graft.
4. Opportunity costs.

The first three will emerge as points on their own. (This is the single best example of opportunity costs. While not a bullet item on its own, that will emerge as a recurrent theme. Second item can be the excessive promotion of religion. That leads us into Israel and Iran, where a second point could be militarism in general, followed by ICE in particular. I might do the attack on democracy next, and the politicization of the courts. Or I could slip in graft somewhere. It's certainly a recurrent theme, but I'm not sure whether it is a driving force or simply a bad habit, as natural to Trump as breathing and lying. The shakedowns of law firms and other businesses, and the monetization of pardons, belong somewhere. Somewhere we need to add the destruction of the civil service, and more generally of public trust. I could end with the vanity projects.

My original idea was to follow up the top ten with five items where the backlash could push us into new territory. That may take a second article.

Email (7 messages):

• Laura sent me mail, under subject "I don't understand this": Seems to be a problem with too many pronouns, so let's clarify: "Meanwhile, Harris and Clinton painted themselves as stalwart devotees of the liberal-globalist status quo. So while on any nerdy policy survey they [Harris and Clinton] should have fared much better [got more votes] than Trump, at least Trump acknowledged problems [that] needing fixing, and their [Harris/Clinton/all Democrats'] intense hatred of the man [Trump], even more than anything he himself [Trump] said, made them [the voters] think of him [Trump] as their champion." Last part should be rewritten. It's not clear to me whether anyone actually thinks Trump has solutions to their problems, but they find hope in his ambiguity, while being pretty certain that Clinton/Obama/Biden/Harris are responsible for the problems, and have no interest in fixing them.

PS: I tried posting a chunk of the above to Facebook. I also added this as a comment:

Background: I tried pitching TomDispatch (which I've followed since 2002) on a piece, but got turned down ("not taking on new writers"). Being a stubborn sod, I didn't want to leave it at that. I noticed that the editor has been writing a series of increasingly frantic anti-Trump rants, as well as always cycling back to the climate change issue. So I thought my in might be to write my own anti-Trump harangue. I started with the idea of a top-20 list, and I've been refining it down in my head. When/if I write it, I'll give him another chance. Otherwise, it will just go out on my Substack (which is still shy of 100 subscribers; more good stuff coming out there over the next few weeks, including some music and possibly some cooking).

Mar 2001